TV noted

*  I've never watched Masterchef before, but I did have a look at it this year when they came to the Japan week episodes, given that I figured that the locations and food there could be particularly interesting.  

I have to say, the skills expected of the contestants seem a bit ridiculously over the top.  None of this home cooking by people who have had a few successful dinner parties of My Kitchen Rules.  And the personal drama and personality foibles are kept to a minimum too, unlike MKR, where their manipulation is key to the show.  The hosts are serious but personable, and presumably none comes close to the nuttiness of Pete Evans' private views on food and health.  

Yet despite this, I can't say that I warmed to the show.  The cooking and skills are too technical, and the tasks too daunting.  The show is not trashy and manipulative, as MKR routinely is, but it's not much fun, either. 

*  Ninja Warrior will finish its short season this week, but I am very puzzled as to the decisions made when putting this show together.    Each episode is too long, but even then, they make strange decisions as to which contestants to show and which to shorten.  

Often it seems a case of coming back from (one of the many) commercial breaks to be told that one or two guys have succeeded on the course, and you get to see them celebrating for 10 seconds, followed by showing the run of some person having a doomed run that ends half way through.  If I were one of the successful contestants, I'd be pretty annoyed about having my achievement barely acknowledged in the final show, after busting a gut like that.

If it's rating spectacularly well, why don't they make it into one hour episodes, say, 4 or 5 days a week, stretching the season out instead of a odd rush to finish, and show all of the successes.  It's the failures that you can afford to cut, I would have thought.  They could well do with fewer contestants too, I think...